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1st LD: U.S. president calls Florida shooting "homegrown extremism"

Xinhua, June 14, 2016 Adjust font size:

U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday called the Florida shooting that claimed 50 lives, including the shooter, "homegrown extremism" that the U.S. authorities had been worrying about.

"As far as we can tell right now, this is certainly an example of the kind of homegrown extremism that all of us have been so concerned about for a very long time," said Obama at the White House.

According to Obama, so far there was no "clear evidence" that the gunman in Sunday's massacre at a popular gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida had been directed externally.

"It does appear that at the last minute, he announced allegiance to ISIL," said Obama, referring to an acronym of the extremist group the Islamic State based in Syria and Iraq. "But there's no evidence so far that he was, in fact, directed by ISIL." Endit